Railroad companies periodically remove railroad tracks which have been abandoned and are no longer in use. Up to the 1970's, the method employed was to engage a crew of men to remove approximately 90% of the spikes which secure the rails to wooden rail ties. The crew was followed by a track mounted crane and a flatcar. Starting at the remote end of the track, a crew of men would remove the remaining spikes, together with joint barrs and rail anchors, from each rail to thus free the rail which could then be lifted by the crane onto the flatcar. A further follow-up crew would remove and haul fastening materials using bucket loaders and dump trucks and a final clean-up crew would collect the ties.
In the mid 1970's, when considerably more track abandonment occured, railroad companies contracted private companies to remove abandoned lines. Most private companies employed a sled-type wedge which was drawn between the rails and the ties. About 90% of the spikes could be removed by this apparatus. The remaining spikes were removed manually. With the rails now freed from the ties, temporary stock pile areas for the rail would be selected, usually at road crossings, and a joint barr would be removed midway between two temporary stock pile areas thus leaving two strings of connected rail approximately one-half mile long. Joint barrs would then be removed, freed rails placed to the side of the track and individually drawn, using any of a variety of appropriate power equipment, to its respective stock pile area. This procedure would continue until all rails of both strings were disconnected and piled. The rail and materials at the temporary stock pile areas were later transported to a main stock pile site. Spikes, tie plates and rail anchors were collected by means of a bucket loader and placed on a dump truck for transport to the main stock pile site. The wooden ties were removed by means of tracked or rubber-tired vehicles which would scoop up the ties from the track bed. Ties are usually embedded in old ballast and wet dirt and, thus, undesirable foreign material would become part of the tie transport load and would restrict payload. The foreign material would remain with the ties and create a hindrance at the stock yard in that it would necessitate an extensive cleanup operation after grading of the ties had been completed.
In the latter method, all material was handled by truck and, as a result, roads would sustain considerable damage. In addition, the sled-type wedge would bend or twist a percentage of rail.
Thus, the rail removing methods and apparatus employed heretofore were labour and equipment intensive, and therefore costly, caused considerable road damage, resulted in a percentage of bent or twisted rails and loss of material (spikes, tieplates, rail anchors, bolts and the like) due to agitation of the track bed while different materials were being collected at different times and created environmental hazards.